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Rockwood Hoar 

(Late .1 Representative from Massachusetts! 



MEMORIAL ADDRESSES 



* 



Fifty-ninth Congress 
Second Session 



HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
February 10, 1907 



SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 
February 23, 1907 



Compiled under the direction of the Joint Committee on Printing 



WASHINGTON : : GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE : : L9Q7 






i.v. c 



' I 



TABLE OF CONTEXTS. 



r i [, 

Proceedings in the House S 

Prayer by Rev. Henry X. Couden 5. s 

Memorial Addresses by: 

Mr. Washburn, of Massachusetts 

Mr. Boutell, of Illinois '5 

Mr. McCall, of Massachusetts ' s 

Mr. McXary, of Massachusetts 20 

Mr. Sherley, of Kentucky 2 4 

Mr. Lawrence, of Massachusetts 26 

Mr. Olcott, of New York 29 

Mr. Greene, of Massachusetts 3 1 

Mr. Houston, of Tennessee 35 

Mr. Weeks, of Massachusetts ,^ s 

Mr. Parsons, of New York 44 

Mr. Bennett, of New York 4^ 

Mr. Olmsted, of Pennsylvania 5 1 

Mr. Murphy, of Missouri 54 

Mr. Chaney, of Indiana 5° 

Mr. Macon, of Arkansas 

Mr. Butler, of Tennessee °5 

Mr. Lovering, of Massachusetts 67 

Mr. Gillett, of Massachusetts 69 

Mr. Grosvenor, of Ohio 73 

Proceedings in the Senate 75 

Memorial Addresses by: 

Mr. Lodge, of Massachusetts 77 

Mr. Curtis, of Kansas 

Mr. Crane, of Massachusetts s 4 

3 



Death of Representative Rockwood Hoar 



proceedings in the house 

Monday, December ,\ rpo6. 

This being the day designated by the Constitution for the 
annual meeting of Congress, the Members of the House of 
Representatives assembled in their Hall for the second ses- 
sion of the Fifty-ninth Congress, and at 12 o'clock m. were 
called to order by the Speaker. 

The Rev. Henry N. Couden, D. I)., Chaplain of the House, 
offered the following prayer: 

Eternal God, our Heavenly Father, source of all good, 
our hearts instinctively turn to Thee for wisdom, strength, 
and guidance as we thus gather from all sections of our 
Union here under the Dome of its Capitol to conclude the 
work of the Fifty-ninth Congress. We bless Thee for the 
laws with which Thou hast surrounded us, for the intel- 
ligence with which Thou hast endowed us, lor the riches 
which have come down to us out of the past, for the 
splendid opportunities of the present, and for the bright 
hopes and promises of the future. Grant, O most merciful 
Father, that these Thy servants may strive diligently to 
conform their resolves and harmonize their enactments 
with the laws which Thou hast ordained. 

5 



6 Proceedings in the House 

Let Thy richest blessings descend upon the Speaker of 
this House, that with characteristic zeal, energy, and cour- 
age he may guide through all its deliberations to the high- 
est and best results. 

Illumine from on high the minds of those who sit in judg- 
ment upon the laws enacted by the Congress that their de- 
cisions ma\ be wise and just. Bless, we beseech Thee, the 
President of these United States, his advisers, and all others 
in authority, that the affairs of state may be wisely admin- 
istered and the laws of the land faithfully executed, that the 
coordinate branches of the Government, thus working to- 
gether and working with Thee, may fulfill in larger meas- 
ure the ideals conceived of our fathers in "a government of 
the people, by the people, and for the people," that right- 
eousness, truth, justice, peace, and good will may obtain, to 
the honor and glory of Thy holy name. 

The empty seats on the floor of this House remind us of 
the strong-minded, pure-hearted, noble men who occupied 
them, but have been called to the higher life since last we 
met. We thank Thee for their genial presence so long 
among us, the work they accomplished for .State and nation, 
tlu- sweet memory and illustrious examples left behind them. 
Be very near, O God, our Heavenly Father, to the bereaved 
families. Uphold, sustain, and comfort them by the blessed 
hope of the immortality of the soul. 

Impart, we implore Thee, more of Thyself unto us all, 
that we may become in deed and in truth sons of the living 
Cod after the similitude of Thy .Sou Jesus Christ our Lord 
and Master. Amen. 



Proceedings in the House 

Mr. Gillett of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, two years 
ago to-day it was my sad duty to make formal announce- 
ment here of the death of Senator George F. Hoar. Now 
death has left vacant in this House the place of his son 
RocKwoni) Hoar, who died at his home, in Worcester, 
Mass., on the ist day of last November. 

He was elected to Congress just as his father passed awaj , 
and I think all men rejoiced in the hope that the magnifi- 
cent record of the father might be taken up and long con- 
tinued by the son. We do not in this country yield honors 
to heredity, but our sentiment and onr judgment alike are 
captivated when we see the talents and character of a great 
father renewed and perpetuated in a worthy son. Our late 
colleague gave promise of such an inheritance, and in our 
short association here gave us reason to expect as well as 
hope that the duty to which three generations of eminent 
public service inspired and pledged him would be faithfully 
and honorably and adequatelv performed. 

The practice of this House does not permit now of eulogy, 
but later in the session we shall ask that a day be set apart 
for consideration of his life and public service. 

I now offer the following resolution. 

The Clerk read as follows : 

Rt solved, That the House has heard with profound sorrow of the 
death of Hon. Rockwood Hoar, a Representative from the State of 
Massachusetts. 

Resolved, That as a further mark of respect to the memory of the 
deceased this House do now adjourn. 

The resolutions were agreed to. Accordingly, in pursu- 
ance thereof, the House (at 12 o'clock and 54 minutes 
p. m. ) adjourned until to-morrow at 1 2 o'clock noon. 



8 Proceedings in the Hous< 

Monday, January ~, hjoj. 
Mr. Washburn. Air. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent 
for the present consideration of the order which I send to 

the desk. 

The Clerk read as follows: 

i Ordered, That there be .1 session of the House on Sunday, February ro, 
[907, at 12 m., which shall be set apart for memorial addresses on the life, 
character, and public services of Hon. Rockwood Hoar, late a Repre- 
sentative from the Third Congressional district of Massachusetts. 

The SPEAKER. Is there objection? [After a pause.] The 

Chair hears none. 

The question was taken, and the order was agreed to. 

Sunday, February /<<, rpoy. 

The House met at 12 o'clock in., and was called to order 
by Hon. William C. Lovering, of Massachusetts, Speaker 
pro tempore. 

The Chaplain, Rev. Henry X. Couden, D. D., offered the 
following prayer: 

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, we are met here on 
this holy day in memory of the men to whom the hour is 
set apart that their virtues may be extolled and a proper 
and just estimate placed upon their public service that those 
who ci mie after them may be inspired by their example. 

This is fitting, since the life and perpetuity of our 
Republic depend upon individual loyalty and patriotic 
service. The life and character of these men measure up 
to the high estimate of American citizenship. We thank 
Thee fur what they did in their respective cities and States 
and for what they did here 011 the floor of this House 
for the people of our Republic. We thank Thee for the 



Proceedings in the 1 1 mis, 9 

blessed hope of the immortality of the soul, that men's 
deeds not only live after thetn, but that the soul goes 
marching on to larger attainments. Comfort, we beseech 

Thee, the colleagues, friends, and kindred of these men 
that somehow, somewhere, they shall meet again and be 
forever blest through the dispensation of (rod's eternal 
love and providence, and glory and honor be Thine forever 
in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

Mr. Washburn. Mr. Speaker, I offer the following reso- 
lutions, which I send to the Clerk's desk. 

The Clerk read as follows: 

Resolved, That the business of the House be now suspended that oppor- 
tunity may be given for tributes to the memory of Hon. Rockwood Hoar, 
late a Member of this House from the State of Massachusetts. 

Resolved, That as a particular mark of respect to the memory of the 
deceased and in recognition of his distinguished public career, the 
House, at the conclusion of the memorial exercises of the day, shall stand 
adjourned. 

Resolved, That the Clerk communicate these resolutions to the Senate. 

Resolved, That the Clerk send a copy of these resolutions to the family 
of the deceased. 

The resolutions were unanimously agreed to. 



i' i -'A morial . iddresses: Rockwood Hoar 



MEMORIAL ADDRESSES 



Address of Mr. Washburn, of Massachusetts 

Mr. Speaker: Coining here as the successor of Rock- 
wood Hoar, I am glad to speak of his life on this occasion 
in the place where his last work was done and where he is 
so much beloved. 

We were nearly of the same age; we were both born in 
Worcester; we had the same friends; we were graduated at 
the same college. 

As a boy he was manly, generous, chivalrous, fond of 
sttuh', active in sports — ambitious to excel in whatever he 
undertook. His ideals were of the highest, and the charac- 
teristics of the boy remained the characteristics of the man. 

His death not only terminated a useful life, but removed 
from the rolls of public men a name that from colonial 
days has had a conspicuous place in the Commonwealth of 
Massachusetts and in the nation. 

Concord was the home of his family, a town rich in its 
associations with our history, our literature, and our 
philosophy. 

In i 7 7 s , "on the 19th of April, the curtain rose on that 
mighty drama in the world's history of which the quiet 
villages of Lexington and Concord were the appointed 
theater." 

Here lived and wrote and talked Emerson, Thoreau, and 
Hawthorne. Here Samuel Hoar was born in 177S, of whom 



. Iddress of Mr. Washburn^ <>/ Massachusetts i i 

Emerson said, "His character made him the conscience of 
the community in which he lived." 

Samuel Hoar's father, two grandfathers, and three uncles 
were at Concord bridge, in the Lincoln company, of which 
his father was lieutenant. 

He was distinguished among the great lawyers who then 
adorned the Massachusetts bar. The Commonwealth selected 
him to test in Charleston the constitutionality of certain 
laws of South Carolina relating to the imprisonment of negn i 
seamen, but the temper of the times prevented the carrying 
out of the purpose. 

Harvard College chose him to protect its interests when 
the legislature sought to change its corporate form, and of 
his service then President Walker said: " Other men have 
served the college ; Samuel Hoar saved it." 

He was a member of the Massachusetts legislature and 
was for one year in Congress, succeeding Edward Everett 
for the Middlesex district in 1835. 

In 1812 Samuel Hoar married a daughter of Roger Sher- 
man, of Connecticut. His three sons were all lawyers. 
Edward, after practicing for a time successfully on the 
Pacific coast, came back to Concord to spend his remaining 
years in his garden and among his books. Ebenezer Rock- 
wood filled a large place in the public affairs of Massachu- 
setts and of the nation. He was a great lawyer, was judge 
of the court of common pleas, justice of the supreme judicial 
court, Attorney-General in Grant's first Cabinet, and Mem- 
ber of Congress. Lowell well described him when he said : 

The judge who covers with his hat 

More wit and gumption and shrewd Yankee sense 

Than there are mosses on an old stone fence. 



12 Memorial . Iddresses: Rockwood Hoar 

The third son, George Frisbie Hoar, was born in Concord 
in 1826, and moved to Worcester in 1849, ^ or ^ e reason, 
as he has said, that — 

That city and county were the stronghold of the new antislavery party, 
to which cause I was devoted with all my heart and soul. 

Here, in 1853, ^ r - Hoar married .Mary Louisa Spnrr, 
a woman of «reat personal charm, who died in 1859. 
Her grandfather, Gen. John Spnrr, of Charlton, Mass., was 
one of the Boston tea party. Her mother was descended 
from Rev. Joint Campbell, the first minister of Oxford, 
Mass., whose line runs back to the early Scottish chiefs, 
and among her ancestors are men who served in the colo- 
nial wars and in the war of the Revolution. A brother 
of Mrs. Hoar, Thomas Jefferson Spnrr, a graduate of Har- 
vard University, received a commission in the Fifteenth 
Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers, was wounded at 
Antietam, and died in September, 1862, of whom it was 
said: "He was loving and tender and brave and heroic." 
Of such an ancestry Rockwood Hoar was born in Wor- 
cester, August 24, 1855. 

He prepared for college in the public schools of Wor- 
cester and entered Harvard in the class of 1876. This 
was the college of his family, of which Leonard Hoar 
was an early president, where many of the name had 
graduated and on whose governing boards his father, 
uncle, and cousins had served at diffierent times. Rock- 
wood was an excellent student, serious minded, and a 
considerable reader, greatly liked by those who knew him 
well, and respected by all his classmates. He had great 
pride in the achievements of his family and an earnest 



Address of Mr. Washburn, of Massachusetts i } 

desire to do his part in maintaining the high standards 
for which the name had always stood. .After graduation 
he read law in his father's office in Worcester, and later 
was graduated from the Harvard Law School, in C878, 
and was admitted to the Worcester County bar in 1879. 
He at once entered upon the general practice of the law 
and always held a prominent place at the bar. He was 
assistant district attorney for Worcester County from [884 
until 1887, and was district attorney for two terms, from 
1899 until 1905. He performed the duties of this impor- 
tant office in a spirit that was just, generous, and sympa- 
thetic. He was councilman in the city of Worcester for 
four years, ending in 1891, during which year he was 
president of the council. 

He was an aid-de-camp on the staff of Governor ( (liver 
Ames from 1887 until 1890 and judge-advocate on the staff 
of Governor Roger Wolcott from 1897 until 1900, and dur- 
ing the Spanish war was chairman of the board charged 
with equipping the Massachusetts troops. 

He was always prominent in the educational, literary, 
and church life of the community in which he lived, and 
rendered faithful service in governing boards of the public 
institutions of the State. Like his father, he could always 
be relied upon to champion the cause of the weak, the 
unfortunate, and the oppressed. 

In his home life he was at his best, most tender and affec- 
tionate in his relations with his family. 

It was with the deepest satisfaction that he entered upon 
his service in Congress. It began just as the long and 



14 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

distinguished career of his father ended. Possibly a con- 
sciousness that much was expected of him may have 
stimulated him to efforts too great for his physical strength. 
I know that when engaged in his committee work of the 
revision of the statutes he said to a friend, who ur^ed him 
not to overtax himself, that his nncle when in Congress had 
been occupied in the same work, and that he considered it 
a great honor to have an opportunity to participate in it. 
< >f his service here others will speak; that it was of a char- 
acter highly satisfactory to his constituents is evidenced by 
the fact that he was renominated without opposition. 

Mr. Hoar was taken ill in September and died Novem- 
ber i, the progress of his disease, tumor of the brain, being 
■beyond the power of human skill to stay. His two cousins, 
sous of Judge Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar, have died within 
a few years — Sherman, in 1N0.N, who served in the Fifty- 
second Congress and was United States attornev for the 
Massachusetts district, whose labors in behalf of our soldiers 
returned from the Spanish war induced the disease which 
ended his life at the early age of 38; and Samuel, a lawyer 
of great attainments and reputation, a fine type of rugged 
American citizenship, who died in Concord less than three 
years ago in his fifty-ninth vear. Of this great race of 
patriots, lawvers, statesmen, and scholars, Rockwood Hoar 
was the last of the men of his name and generation con- 
spicuous in the affairs of his State and of the nation. 



Address of Mr. Bouhil, oj Illinois 



Address of Mr. Boutell, of Illinois 

Mr. Speaker : When R< »ckwood Hoar entered the 
House at the opening of this Congress, he looked forward 
confidently to a long term of 'service, and his constituents 
had every reason to expect for him a career of exceptional 
usefulness not only to them but to the nation. He was well 
equipped for service in this body, for he brought to the dis- 
charge of his public duties a well-trained and scholarly mind, 
sound judgment, ripe experience as a lawyer who had dealt 
with large professional and business interests, combined with 
firmly established principles. Rockwood Hoar came of 
a long- line of Puritan ancestors, many of whom rendered 
distinguished services to their Commonwealth and to the 
nation. The question is often asked, What is the chief trait 
that has been handed down to their descendants by the 
Puritans of New England? It is a certain stability and 
erectuess of intellect that glories in a fearless devotion to a 
principle when the crowd is hurrying another way. Many 
a large man of bluff manners and a boisterous independence 
of speech and of undoubted physical courage mentally and 
morally slouches and leans upon the sterner, truer intellects 
of men of greater uprightness of mind. The true descend, 
ant of the Puritans is the man who, while he may have dis- 
carded many of the grim beliefs and somber practices of his 
forefathers, still rejoices, as they did, in a sort of sublime 
devotion to truth for truth's sake. 



16 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

Such a man is never a hypocrite in religion, a trimmer in 
polities, a time-server in morality, or a weathercock in his 
friendships. Ralph Waldo Emerson was a true and noble 
descendant of the Puritans. So was Samuel Hoar, his 
friend and neighbor at Concord, the grandfather of our col- 
league, a learned lawyer and broad-minded philanthropist, 
who served in this House in the Twenty-fourth Congress 
So was our colleague's father, the illustrious .Senator, who 
through a long public service gave many illustrations of this 
fearless devotion to absolute truth in the performance of his 
public duties. So was Rockwooii Hoar, and it is this 
shining trait in his character which comes prominently 
before my mind at this time. 

( )ne of the pleasantest features, Mr. Speaker, of service 
in this body is the bringing together in our natural life of 
the friends and associates of our childhood and youth. 
What the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Washburn] 
has spoken of this morning reminds me that in 1876 
Rockwood Hoar, Mr. Justice Moody, and I, together with 
other classmate's, met in one of the small upper rooms in 
old University Hall at Harvard College, in the popular 
course of Roman law, in which we all took a great interest, 
owing largely to the inspiring methods of our teacher. No 
one of us, at that time surely, ever dreamed that thirty 
years thereafter we should meet together here in Washing- 
ton in the public service. 

Those who met him first on this floor soon recognized this 
trait, for he often gave quiet evidences of it. I remember one 
occasion early in the last session when his attitude called 
forth approving applause from his fellow-Members who 



Address of Mr. Boutell, oj Illinois \- 

differed with him in their views. A rising vote was taken 
on a question involving indirectly the policy of the Govern- 
ment toward our new possessions. The -teat majority of 
the Hou.se, regardless of political divisions, had voted in 
the affirmative. Ordinarily a new Member of the House 
finds himself voting almost automatically with the major- 
ity. It is the easy, the popular, and therefore the natural 
thing to do. But the Puritan mind never looks for the easy 
or the popular thing, and when the noes wire called for on 
this vote ROCKWOOD Hoar stood up for the truth as he- 
saw it, to the surprise of those Members who did not know 
him, but with the admiring approval of all. He voted as 
his father would have voted under similar circumstances. 

It was my good fortune to know ROCKWOOD Hoar as a 
kinsman, as a classmate at college, as the friend who stood 
beside ine during the most important event of my life, and 
as an associate in our service in this House, and I know 
that in his death a strong, true nature has left us. But 
while we lament our apparent loss let us not forget that the 
influence of such a life never perishes. 

ROCKWOOD Hoar was the finest type of the descendants 
of the Puritans, and during his life and at the hour of death 
he nobly maintained the loftiest traditions of his race. He- 
left us an example of how a modern Puritan should live 
and how an ancient Puritan could die. 

II. Doc. So6, 59-2 2 



Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mf. McCall, of Massachusetts 

Mr. Speaker : (July those who knew Rockwood Hoar 
can appreciate the great loss his country suffered in his 
death. He had unfolded to his friends a fine capacity 
for public service which he did not have a full opportunity 
to exhibit to the country. He was permitted to serve only 
a single session in the House of Representatives — a session 
that was passed in familiarizing himself with the procedure, 
in becoming acquainted with his colleagties, and in learn- 
ing- exactlv the character of his new duties. That he 
would have distinguished himself in a longer service there 
can be no manner of doubt. He had many of the qualities 
that made the career of his father illustrious — the insight 
to see elearlv into the meaning of things; the power to 
give adequate expression to his thought ; industry ; an un- 
bending courage and spirit of independence, and shrewd, 
penetrating, Yankee common sense. Much as he owed 
to inheritance, he owed as much, if not more, to education. 
He was trained in the best schools, but far better than 
the best schools must be reckoned the influence of his 
father and the splendid ideals which he illustrated in his 
life. Our colleague [Mr. Boutell] has referred to one of his 
votes in the House which shows his independence of mind 
and his svmpathy with his father in the latter's heroic and 
ever-memorable struggle in behalf of the people of the 



Address of Mr. .!/< Call, of Massachusetts is 

Philippine Islands. ROCKWOOD HOAE was a man who 
took a wholesome and hopeful outlook, and the words of 
Emerson may well be applied to the view according to 
which he lived his inspiring and noble life: 

l.ife is too short tn waste 

The critic bite nr cynic bark, 
Quarrel or reprimand; 

'Twill soon be dark; 
Up ! mind thine own aim, and 

God speed the mark. 



20 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mr. McNary, of Massachusetts 

Mr. Speaker: Rockwood Hoar was the scion of fami- 
lies distinguished in the annals of two States. One of his 
ancestors, Roger Sherman, as a representative of Connecti- 
cut in the Continental Congress, signed the Declaration of 
Independence, and the Hoar name has been identified with 
the public life of Massachusetts from Revolutionary days 
to the present. Upon several occasions two members of 
this distinguished family were prominent in public life at 
the same time, and their independence of thought and 
catholicity of mind was shown by the fact that, while 
rendering good and loyal service to the country, they 
frequently disagreed upon political ideals and principles. 

Coming from a stock of such renown, it may truthfully 
l>e said that more in the way of capacity and achievement 
was expected of Rockwood Hoar than of the ordinary 
man who entered this great representative body when he 
became a Member of the Fifty-ninth Congress. His great 
father, the late Senator Hoar, beloved by all the people 
of his .State, in the rich fullness of his years of great and 
distinguished service, had recently passed from these scenes 
to meet in another world the reward of an honorable life. 

It is given to but few men of any day or generation to 
have the strength of character, the beauty of disposition, 
the depth of mind, the power of statement, the aptness of 
illustration, the height of eloquence and soul-stirring power 
of oratory of George Frisbie Hoar. 



Address of Mr. McNary, of Massachusetts 21 

The service of ROCKWOOD Hoar in this body was ill 
too brief to get a complete view of his distinguished tal- 
ents and ability. The earnesl study which he gave to the 
great subjects of national legislation, the independence ol 
view which he showed, the wisdom of the conclusions 
which he drew, proved clearly that he had great capacity 
for thought and leadership, which, ripened and strengthened 
by experience, would have placed him on a high level 
among his associates and given additional luster to the 
honored name he bore. 

Rockwood Hoar brought to the National Legislature of 
his country many rich gifts of mind and character. He 
had the broad and liberal culture given by the university 
course of Harvard, widened and deepened by the thorough 
training of its law school. Unlike many men of education, 
breeding, and social position, he did not disdain the hum- 
bler spheres of public life, but gave to his native city of 
Worcester, in the legislative branch of its government, the 
benefit of his training, culture, and excellent judgment. 
He regarded such work as an honorable duty and discharged 
it with faithfulness and honesty. 

His public service of most usefulness and of most distinc- 
tion previous to his entrance into the sphere of national 
legislation was in the line of his profession as district attor- 
ney of the county of Worcester. He discharged his duties 
with energy, ability, and punctuality. He had all the char- 
acteristics of a good prosecuting officer — determined, aggres- 
sive, vigorous, and possessing a high degree of executive 
force, quick to decide and to act. He was always ready to 
fight strenuously for what he knew was right. Compas- 



22 Memorial . Iddresses: Rockwood Hoar 

sionate and generous hearted by nature, he was equally ready 
to temper justice with mercy; to spare the weak, help the 
unfortunate, defend the injured and oppressed, and to relieve 
the distressed. He had a horror of the law's delays, and 
suggested and obtained a number of improvements in court 
procedure and legislation which were of benefit to the tri- 
bunals, the accused, and the community. 

He viewed all his duties and responsibilities seriously, 
and accepted them with a loyalty and a single-mindedness 
of purpose which commanded admiration and respect. 

In his personal attributes he was a lovable man, though 
his manner was often brusque and his speech aggressive. 
Through this outward bluntness and seeming roughness, 
however, shone such an honesty of intention, straightfor- 
wardness, and candor that it possessed a strong attractive- 
ness in its evidence of his sincerity and manliness. Like 
all courageous men, he was at heart gentle and generous, 
and he never, even though secure in his positions of power, 
wounded bv insinuation, invective, or scorn. 

In his moments of relaxation he showed a boyish light- 
heartedness, a pleasant and wholesome humor, and a quick 
and appreciative sympathy. His private life was clean, 
wholesome, and honorable. Of the serene contentment and 
happiness of his family life, which we all saw and knew, it 
is not my place here to speak. 

To whatever higher point his talents and abilities would 
have carried him had his life been spared we may not know. 
But this we do know, that his standing among his fellow- 
men would never have been measured by his success in 
amassing wealth. It would have been in appreciation of 



Address of Mr. McJVary, of Massachusetts 23 

his work for the uplifting and the benefit of his people and 
his country and in a sincere admiration of his character. 
For, above all else, the respect for RoCKWOOD Hoar among 
men was for the sterling qualities of his strong character. 

In these days when stories, in many cases true, of dis- 
honesty and dishonor in public and in business and profes- 
sional life are rife, it is being borne in on the people with 
ever-increasing force that the future life of the nation, its 
success or failure, does not depend on the culture, the 
brilliancy, the talent, the abilitv of its leaders in legislative 
or business life, but in the honesty and uprightness of their 
character. 

No taint of corruption or dishonor ever stained the purity 
of RoCKWOOD Hoar's probity. His character was two 
strong to be vitiated bv the enticements of luxury and 
wealth. In the light of his life and example we can safely 
believe that the days of honesty, of Jronor, of high ideals, 
are not over in the commonwealth and in the nation, and 
that the underlying moral firmness of character among our 
people assures the future welfare of the Republic. 



2 | Memorial Addresses; Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mb. Sherley, of Kentucky 

Mr. Speaker : It so happened that without any previous 
acquaintanceship with Rockwood Hoar before he became 
a Member of this Congress, I afterwards was in, perhaps, 
more intimate daily contact with him than am man in the 
House. Therefore it is fitting that I should bear testimony 
to the very valuable, quiet work that he did — a work 
unknown to most of the Members of the House. He was 
appointed a member of the Committee on Revision of the 
Laws, the labor of which was very constant and unremitting. 
Me brought to that work a knowledge of the law, a determi- 
nation, and a high-mindedness possessed by few men, and 
without regard to the^fact that the work of necessitv would 
never be known or appreciated save by a limited number of 
people, be gave liberally of his time and energy during his 
whole service in the House. The questions that came 
before the committee were varied and difficult enough to 
test thoroughly the character of the man and the workings 
of his mind. The one trait that shone forth above all was 
the trait that has been spoken of by others here to-day, and 
that was the absolute integrity of his mind. Most men 
have honesty, as we commonlv know the term, but honestv 
in the final analysis, as it applies to the workings of the 
intellect, is one of the rarest as it is perhaps the greatest of 
gifts. He never hesitated to follow the conclusions of his 
intellect no matter where thev led. But this integrity of 



Address of Mr. Sker/ey, of Kentucky 25 

mind was wholly free from anj dogmatism. Limited, as all 

men are, by his ancestry, limited by environment, by associa- 
tion, and by training, yet repeatedly when his natural dis- 
position in a given direction was found to run counter to 
what proved to be the law and the settled will of the whole 
country, there would be a willing acquiescence in such judg- 
ment that showed not the least evidence of reluctance in 
yielding his own personal views. 

I knew him also in a personal way, because out of the 
labor that we were together engaged in grew up a warm 
personal friendship. He was always the gentleman, illus- 
trating the true meaning of that word, a gentle man — a man 
who thought kindly — who was always generous, happy in 
his association with his fellow-men ; and because he was 
never suspicious of other men's motives, never needed to do 
anything from a politic motive, but simply out of his 
faith in mankind, he gave to the world what he expected 
from it — honestv and fair dealing. 



26 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mr. Lawrence, of Massachusetts 

Mr. Speaker: Not quite two years ago there was held 
in this House a memorial service to a great Senator. 
Death had taken from Massachusetts her foremost citizen. 
The people of that Commonwealth loved and respected 
Senator Hoar, because through a long and noble life he 
had shown courage, self-sacrifice, a high sense of duty, and 
an absolute fidelity to the highest ideals. Though a man 
of undoubted loyalty to the State, his object had ever been 
his whole country. It is not surprising, therefore, that 
when he passed away sorrow was not confined within the 
limits of Massachusetts, but that from every State in our 
Union there came sincere expressions of a sense of loss. 
And when the Members of this House gathered here to 
offer their tribute to the patriot who had gone, men from 
all sections and of differing political faith eagerly bore 
testimony to their affection for him and to their admiration 
of his great abilities, the purity of his life, and the nobilitv 
of his character. 

A few days after the death of this beloved statesman the 
Republicans of the Third Congressional district of Massa- 
chusetts, at a convention held in the city of Worcester, 
chose Rockwood Hoar, the Senator's only son, as their 
candidate for Representative in Congress. The people 
who had so long followed and honored the father knew 
that the si in would not be unmindful of his noble heritage 



Address of Mr. Lawrence, of Massachusetts 27 

and emphatically ratified the nomination at the polls. On 
the first Monday of December, 1905, RoCKWOOD HoAK 
took the oath of office and began his work herewith every 
promise <>f a long and useful life in the public service. 
But that promise was not to be realized. A few months 
went by and then his colleagues, who in that brief time 
had learned to love and esteem him, were shocked by the 
sad announcement that he had passed away. 

It is in accord with an honored custom of this House that 
this day has been set apart for heartfelt tributes to the mem- 
ory of an able and devoted associate. Rockw< »OD I Ioak was 
brave, straightforward, and honorable. He was direct and 
genuine. Despising humbug, sham, and hypocrisy, he rang 
true in all the relations of life. There was nothing negative 
about him. Active and practical in whatever position he 
was placed, he became a positive force and made his influ- 
ence felt. He thought for himself, and had developed those 
qualities so essential to success — courage and self-reliance. 
During his short service in the House he, on more than one 
occasion, showed that courage and independence of which I 
speak. He had convictions and spoke and voted here in 
accord with those convictions. While he was an active 
working Republican, a partisan, who believed sincerely in 
the principles and purposes of his party, he never hesitated 
to vote against that party when he believed it to be wrong. 

Before coming to Congress Mr. Hoar had played an active 
part in the life of his city and county and State. Wherever 
there was a demand for disinterested work he was ready to 
do his share and always labored for that which was high- 
est and best. He was verv industrious and his work was 



2S Memorial . Iddresses: Rockwood Hoar 

characterized by intelligence and earnestness of purpose. 
He entered upon his work as a Member of Congress with 
-real enthusiasm, was constant in his attendance, and showed 
unflagging industry in the important work of the commit- 
tees to which he had been assigned. It is certain that he- 
would have gained a position of influence. Honors would 
have come to him through the faithful performance of pub- 
lic duties, for his life here would have been characterized 
above all else by an unyielding devotion to duty. 

Senator Hoar shortly before his death said : " It has been 
the good fortune of the Massachusetts delegation of late 
\ ears that they have been a band of brethren and friends, 
increasing the influence of the old Commonwealth by cor- 
dial cooperation in everything that has made for her interest 
or for the interest of the country as her people conceive it." 
It was in that spirit of friendship and fraternity that R.OCK- 
WOOD Hoar became a member of our delegation. We per- 
form no perfunctory duty to-day and shall forever sacredly 
cherish the memory of this friend who proved himself so 
kind and helpful an associate. His noble manhood and 
lovable personality can not fail to be a genuine inspiration 
during the vears that are to come. It is therefore indeed 
fitting that we should record here our affection for him and 
niir appreciation of his honorable and useful life. 



Address of Mr. Olcott, of New York 29 



Address of Mr. Olcott, of New York 

Mr. Speaker: I want to add but a word or two as 
tribute to the memory of Rockwood Hoar. I count it as 
one of the pleasantest experiences that I have had in this 
Congress that in the distribution of seats it was my good 
fortune to be placed next to him. I think I never in 
my maturer years have made an acquaintance which so 
quickly ripened into friendship. Seeing him every day, 
talking with him during much of the session, I can say- 
that from his expressions and from his actions I think he 
was a man who never offended his own conscience. I do 
not think that there would have been anv consideration 
that would have made Mr. Hoar do anything that he 
did not believe was right. There was another sterling 
quality in him. He had that pride of great and distin- 
guished ancestry that made it his ambition not only not 
to sully the reputation of that ancestry, but to add to its 
luster. His pride of ancestry did not beget supineness, 
but it stimulated industry and ambition to do well. 

The last time that I saw him was on the other side of 
the water, and he was looking forward with such antici- 
pation of pleasure at returning here to his work, especially 
upon that committee of which the gentleman from Ken- 
tucky [Mr. Sherley] has spoken, that it was as if he could 
scarcelv wait to have the time pass when he could get 



30 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

back here in harness again. But it was not to be; and so 
not only his friends from Massachusetts, but all who have 
had any association with him on committee or on the 
floor of this Honse, must think of him only as a dear and 
tender memory. 



Address of Mr. Greene, of Massachusetts 3] 



Address of Mr. Greene, of Massachusetts 

Mr. SPEAKER: As we meet to-day for the purpose "l 
recording our words of tribute to the memory of one of our 
lamented colleagues, I am reminded of the uncertainty of 
human life and how brittle is the thread which hinds us 
together in our earthly careers. 

As Rockwood Hoar had always resided in a portion of 
the Commonwealth of Massachusetts remote from the city 
in which I reside, I had seldom met him until he took his 
seat in the first session of the Fifty-ninth Congress and 
began his Congressional life. Frequent conferences of 
the Massachusetts delegation upon matters relating to the 
political and material interests of the State brought me into 
more intimate relations with him. I had known his father, 
the late Senator Hoar, for man}- years, and I thought 1 
discerned in the son some of the prominent features which 
made the father one of the best beloved of the long line of 
public servants who had been called upon to serve the great 
Commonwealth in the stirring periods of the nation's life. 

Rockwood Hoar had convictions upon public questions 
which he never hesitated to assert. Sometimes I noticed, 
when the roll was called, he and I were found recorded in 
opposition to each other, but I always felt that he had been 
guided by his conscientious convictions. His father had 
never sought to look for popular acclaim, and Massachusetts 



32 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

always held him in the highest esteem, and her citizens gave 
to him their continuous confidence and support even when 
many of her most prominent men were inclined to look upon 
some public questions in a manner very much different than 
he had freely and frankly expressed himself. 

Rockwood Hoar gave promise of a distinguished career, 
and if his life had been spared to the general allotted period 
of manhood his record of accomplishment would have bril- 
liantly adorned the pages of history. He had barely passed 
the half century of life, and apparently had many vears of 
usefulness before him. He came from sturdy Puritan stock. 
Naturally he was a student. With his home training and 
the advantage accorded by the public school system of the 
city of Worcester he was enabled to graduate from Harvard 
College in his early youth, and only a few years thereafter 
he engaged in the practice of law, became assistant district 
attorney, and subsequently district attorney, which last 
position he occupied at the time of his election to Congress. 

His quiet demeanor and peaceful appearance would not 
lead one to think that he had an aptitude for military life, 
but he served as a private in the Massachusetts militia and 
also on the military staff of two governors of the Common- 
wealth, once serving as judge-advocate-general, besides being 
president of a military board of advisors during the Spanish 
war. In these capacities he was fulfilling the high duties 
of American citizenship, inherent in his nature from the 
ancestral stock from which he sprang in the town of Con- 
cord, where the earlier conflicts of the Revolution first 
awakened the patriotic natures of the sturdy farmers to the 



Address bj Mr. G-reene, oj Massachusetts 33 

laying of the foundation of the Republic which ii was his 
ambition to serve faithfully and well. 

He was assigned by Speaker Cannon to the Commit 
on Elections and on Revision of the Laws. These com- 
mittees were engaged in a line of work which was congenial 
to him, and I frequently heard his associates speaking in 
the highest terms of his very faithful and efficient service. 
If his life had been spared, the entire membership of the 
House would have had an opportunity to have estimated 
his public service by the standard which those associated 
with him in committee work were enabled to place upon 
him. The work of the revision of the laws is of great 
importance, and during the long period of his first session 
in Congress he gave to that work his best talent. The 
result has been printed, and it will add to the glory of 
his earthly accomplishments, and it will be of immense 
advantage to countless millions of his countrvmen in their 
future transactions in the courts of law and in the exten- 
sion of their commercial relations in the activities of business 
life. 

Mr. Hoar seemed to enjoy his work here. He was am- 
bitious to be useful because of the «- od he could do for 
others. There was no apparent selfishness in his nature. 
His wife and children seemed happy and contented, and to 
the ordinarv citizen there would seem to be even- element 
which marked the prospect of success and a long and 
brilliant career. But the All-wise Ruler of the Universe, 
by causing " the silver cord to be loosened and golden 
bowl to be broken," finished the work which human wis- 

H. Doc. Su6, 59-2 3 



}4 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

dom had regarded unfinished. We can not penetrate the 
mystery of death. It attacks the youth, with his years of 
hope and promise of future fulfillment, and sooner or later 
all must yield to its dread call. And we who are permitted 
to remain to fulfill our earthly careers must take up the 
burden, where our colleagues have laid it down. 

It was my privilege to be appointed one of the com- 
mittee to pay the last tribute of respect to his lamented 
father, and also I was assigned to the same sad duty to 
my departed colleague. The services of both were held 
in the same church. The citizens of Worcester attended 
the obsequies in large numbers, and there was an expres- 
sion of grief that pervaded the entire community. 

I shall cherish the memory of our departed colleague, 
and willingly pay this feeble tribute to his worth and work. 



Address of Mr. Houston, of Tennessee 35 



Address of Mr- Houston, of Tennessee 

Mr. Speaker: In the first days of the Fifty-ninth Con- 
gress I met for the first time Rockwood Hoar. It was 
my good fortune to be assigned to committee work with 
this man. As members of the same subcommittee of the 
Committee on Revision of the Laws, requiring detailed and 
continuing work, we were . thrown very closely together, 
and I had the opportunity in the intimate association in 
which we were necessarily thrown to observe very fully the 
manner of man he was. The character of this committee 
work seemed congenial to the tastes and preference of the 
man, and he at once impressed me with the enthusiasm and 
spirit that inspired him in the work. He brought to this 
labor a great deal of knowledge and research. In addition 
to the marked ability that was manifest there was a sense 
of justice that stood out so prominent in all his expression 
of views that his opinion commanded attention and respect 
always. He was earnest, yet in no sense dogmatic or arbi- 
trary. While he was tenacious and loyal in his views, yet 
he was ever painstaking and careful in the consideration he 
gave to the opinions of others. He was a modest man, a 
trait so becoming to man as well as woman. 

There are many here who know the life and character of 
the distinguished dead better than I, but I trust that 
although a stranger to him until a few short months before 
his death that it is meet that I should express my regard 



36 Memorial . \ddresses: Rockwood Hoar 

for the man and pay mv tribute of respect and love to his 
memory to-dav. When I had known him a few days I felt 
that I had met a man and a brother. My heart went out to 
him in perfect trust. He was gentle, cordial, and kind, yet 
there was a manly dignity about him that spoke courage 
and strength. His was a charming personality. In manner 
he was affable and without restraint; in conversation he 
was winning indeed. 

1 1 is ready speech flowed fair and free 
In phrase of gentlest courtesj 

He came from a family noted in several generations for 
their patriotism and distinguished public service. To 
those who came in contact with Rockwood Hoar it is 
unnecessary to say that his early environments and advan- 
tages were of the highest order. He was the result of the 
best conditions of our day and times and a credit to our 
civilization. He bore the visible stamp of this degree, and 
it is a matter of just pride to belong to a race and a civiliza- 
tion of which he was the natural product. 

His public service and life history I leave to others to 
tell. I only speak of the man — the individual, as he im- 
pressed me. While he was a worthy scion of a noble stock, 
with a lineage illustrious and great, yet in him was illus- 
trated that — 

Kind hearts are more than coronets 
And simple faith than Norman 1>1 1; 

for while he was of noble lineage and gentle blood, to my 
mind the richest grace and strength of his life and character 
was imparted by his own kind heart and gentle faithful soul. 

In his right hand he carried gentle peace — 



Address of Mr. Houston, <>/ Tennessee 37 

And he was — 

Tn those that sought him sweel as summer. 
I sought him and so I found him. I conceived for him an 
affectionate regard that will abide with me. It enlarges the 
ideals of life to have known such a man. It gives a richer 
conception of manhood, and, to myself, I hold it a blessing 
to have known him. This acquaintance was of short dura- 
tion — seven months embraced it — but that time was long 
enough for me to form a lofty estimate of the man, and I 
esteem it a privilege to bring my offering to-day and join in 
with those who knew him long and well in paying my 
humble tribute to his memory. 

He was at the high tide of a useful and promising career 
when he was called to go and his friends left to mourn. 

The voice of the weeper 
Wails manhood in glory, 
The autumn winds rushing 

Waft the leaves that are serest, 
But our flower was in flushing 

When blighting was nearest. 

Whv this, to our short sight, untimely breaking of the 
bands of mortality; why this dispensation we can not 
answer; we do not ask. It is the inscrutable decree we can 
not fathom, but it is the will that must be done and that 
we must accept. Have we the power to accept it with 
resignation? Let us hope for that power, that gift. We 
now see through a glass darkly; let us trust aud abide in 
the hope of that brighter vision yet to come, for the eye of 
faith looks through the shadows and gloom of death, and 
hope makes radiant the shore beyond. 



38 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mr. Weeks, of Massachusetts 

Mr. Speaker: While I esteem it a privilege to take part 
in these memorial exercises, I feel peculiarly ill fitted to 
put into words the adequate and deserved tribute which I 
know is due to the memory of my friend Rockwood Hoar. 
In this country we feel a just pride in the self-made man 
who, from an humble origin and unpropitious surroundings, 
rises to a position of influence and usefulness in the com- 
munitv, and it is natural that we should honor and applaud 
such a man and his accomplishments. Is there not equal 
reason to admire and praise that son of a distinguished 
ancestrv who has not only maintained the high standards 
of his family, but has at the same time contributed to it 
some additional valuable quality, which is essentially true 
in the case of Rockwood Hoar? Few men can count 
among his ancestors so many who have reached the very 
highest rank in nearlv every walk in life and in every 
period of our national existence. Among them were dis- 
tinguished jurists, humanitarians, lawyers, educators, mili- 
tary men, statesmen and financiers, a president of Harvard 
College, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, a Sen- 
ator from Connecticut, a Secretary of State, a Senator from 
New York, and an Attorney-General of the United States. 
In the direct line his grandfather was a distinguished law- 
yer, a valuable State officer, and Member of Congress; while 
his father, whose death was so generally mourned only two 
years ago, served his State for thirty-five years in the halls 



Address of Mr. Weeks, of Massachusetts 39 

of Congress, leaving a heritage of duty well done unexcelled 
in the history of Massachusetts and probably not excelled 
in the country at large. George Prisbie Hoar retained his 
vigorous intellect and capacity for work until near his end, 
although he lived eight years beyond the allotted time of 
man, an age which strangely has marked the end of mam 
members of his great family. And, while he was sincerely 
mourned not only by those associated with him in public 
life, but by all the people of Massachusetts, there should 
have been incorporated in this mourning a spirit of thank- 
fulness for his long life and the great public work which 
he had been able to perform, a feeling that, though a great 
man had fallen, he had accomplished his life work, and that 
the time had come for him to pass his burdens on to others ; 
and in a large sense this statement would hold true of all 
of the earlier members of this distinguished family. 

But this normal and happy condition ended with the 
generation which included among its members Judge 
Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar and George Frisbie Hoar. The 
former left two sous, Samuel and Sherman. Samuel Hoar, 
like so manv of his ancestors, was a distinguished lawyer, 
and his end came suddenly, when he was hardly past the 
prime of life; while Sherman Hoar, after being elected to 
Congress at an age when he was scarcely eligible, ended 
his life prematurely as a result of disease contracted in 
providing for and caring for our sick soldiers returned from 
Cuba during the Spanish war. The only remaining son of 
the family of his generation, and Senator Hoar's only son, 
was he whose memory we are gathered to-day to pay 
tribute to. It will be seen from what I have said that 



4-0 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

Rockwood Hoar labored under that peculiar disadvantage 
which those descended from or connected with very dis- 
tinguished persons must always face, and especially when, 
as in his case, the distinguished person is a father; for not 
only does he have to meet the natural criticism that what- 
ever he does, either as a public man or in any semipublic 
capacity, is largely influenced, if not entirely due, to the 
recognized wisdom of the senior, but in the case of a son 
he very often, and properly, refrains from assuming public 
positions or semipublic duties for which he is amply fitted, 
feeling that such a course might adversely influence the 
future of his father. There is little reason to doubt that 
such motives governed Rockwood Hoar in his career 
prior to his election to Congress, for until his nomination 
to that office, which occurred the day his father was laid to 
lest, he had never held a political office other than those 
offices which were appointive and directly connected with 
his profession, the law; and such canvass as he had made 
for the nomination was only undertaken when it was 
apparent to all that the days of his father's political 
activities were numbered. There is no other suitable 
reason for his refraining until his fiftieth year from under- 
taking a political career, for which he was undoubtedly 
lilted to an unusual degree, in which he would have, 
without question, filled a place which, while possibly not 
as brilliant as that of his father or some others of his 
family, would have been an honor to himself and a satis- 
faction to his friends and constituency. I do not make this 
statement in the spirit of fulsome praise, for I would not 
offend his memory or my ideas of the proprieties of such 



Address of Mr. Weeks, of Massachusetts 41 

an occasion as this by indulging in flattery, but 1 make it 
because there were certain characteristics which belonged 
in a degree to every member of his family. These charac- 
teristics were the foundation of their success, and they 
were quite as marked in ROCKWOOD Hoar as in those who 
had preceded him; and so with our mourning for his 
untimely end is mixed a deep sense of regret that Ids work 
could not have been carried on to its full fruition. 

I do not feel at liberty in the time allotted me to make a 
complete enumeration of the qualities to which I have re- 
ferred or to take up the ones I do refer to in great detail, 
but a reference to a few of the more prominent will easily 
show that I am justified in making the statement. 

All of the members of his family have been scholars, not 
always specialized scholars, but more frequently scholars 
developed and perfected by careful reading, travel, and the 
best associations. Rockwood Hoar was in this sense a 
scholar. While busily engaged in the active affairs of life, 
he kept in close touch with standard literature, and sought 
the companionship of the best people, and was an educated 
man ; his studies had not ceased, and would not have done 
so as long as life lasted, so that it was natural to assume that 
if he had reached the allotted span of life he would have 
become one of the most accomplished of men. 

All the members of his family have been idealists, not 
the kind of idealists whose enthusiasm led them to seek 
perfect conditions without the practical qualities which 11111st 
be used in the improvement of mankind, but the reverse. 
Rockwood Hoar was the latter kind of an idealist. While 
we have not had in our generation to deal with a great 



42 Memorial Addresses; Rockwood Hoar 

moral question, like slavery, for instance, which has heen 
convulsing in its character, yet there are always with us 
questions of right and wrong on which every man must 
take a stand. He could always be found on the side of the 
right, defending the oppressed, and attempting to uplift 
mankind by those practical methods which were a part of 
his everyday life. 

All the members of his family had an intense patriot- 
ism, to which was allied a keen sense of public duty. < >ne 
of these qualities should be a corollary of the other, for 
patriotism in ordinary times is not dying for one's country, 
hut living for it, living to better it. He had no opportu- 
nity to show his love of country on the battlefield, but he 
did have the opportunity to help make his country a better 
one, and he never missed a citizen's opportunity to assist 
in bringing about better civic conditions or a better public 
service. 

All the members of his family had a broad religious 
tolerance. His honored father especially, among his ances- 
tors, displayed this quality to a marked decree. While 
having strong and pronounced views regarding the future 
life, nothing met his vigorous opposition more quickly or 
more surely stirred his combative temperament than any 
attempt to restrict religious belief or practice. Rockwood 
I h i vr displayed the same characteristics. He was a liberal, 
a Unitarian in his religious belief, but being a liberal did 
not mean that he was vague or indefinite in his views or 
careless in their practice. He was the reverse, but he 
would have fought with all his resources any attempt to 
force on others views in which they did not believe or any 



Address of Mr. Weeks, of Massachusetts 43 

attempt to discriminate against his fellow-men because 
their creed differed from his own. Neither did he pn - 
claim one standard and live another. 

Other members of his family, almost without exception, 
had vigorous prejudices and were combative to an un- 
usual degree. They had a capacity to utter bitter sen- 
tences as well as an unusual loyalty toward those who 
had been tried and found not wanting. R< >ckwi iOD HoAB 
had this latter quality. He may have had the second ; 
though if so, he was extremely chary about using it. But 
in place of the first he had a charming and genial per- 
sonality, and was entirely devoid of prejudice and of the 
combative temperament to which I have alluded. There- 
fore, if my estimate is not overdrawn, there is ample 
reason why the people of Massachusetts should have been 
shocked at his untimely taking away in the prime of 
life, for I believe political conditions were such that he 
might have been returned to this House again and again, 
better and better prepared to represent his people up to 

the highest standards of the past. There is also g 1 

reason why the Members of this House, without limita- 
tions to party lines, should feel that they have met a 
personal loss, for his honored name, his genial, sterling 
character, his gracious presence and bearing had drawn 
all to him in a way which promised unusual popularity 
and usefulness in Washington. Very few men have 
commenced their Congressional careers under more fax (li- 
able auspices; very few have done more in one short 
year to convince those associated with them that their 
preparation was complete for a successful legislative career. 



( i Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mr. Parsons, of New York 

Mr. Speaker: In these days when so many doubts are 
expressed of the value to the individual and the nature of 
inherited wealth, it is refreshing, by contrast, to meditate 
mi the life, character, and services of ROCKWOOD Hoar and 
in them observe the boon to the individual and the nature 
of inherited worth. 

Seldom will it happen that a Member of this House is the 

son of a former Member, who, too, was the son of a former 

Member. ROCKWOOD Hoar was all this and more. In his 

veins coursed the blood of the embattled farmers who fought 

at Concord Ridge. Fit indwelling place was he for that — 

Spirit thai made tli< >>l- heroes dare 
To die and leave their children free. 

With a strong character, well-trained mind, wide expe- 
rience, gentlemanly bearing, and high purposes, lie combined 
sense of honor and geniality of soul that made his companion- 
ship a delight to his friends. In the short service that fate 
permitted him here many had come to recognize these quali- 
ties the first time that he was called to the chair in Com- 
mittee of the Whole. The unusual compliment of applause 
was paid him, and that from both sides of the Chamber. Had 
he lived two characteristics of his would have become in_ 
creasingly prominent. One would have been his usefulness 
as a legislator, due to his ability, industry, experience, and 
inherited knowledge of p-overnment. The other would have 



Address of Mr. Parsons, >>/ Vew Yuri; 45 

been his obedience to conscience — his courage to speak and 
vote as he was given to see the right, whatever the odds. A 
man of his upbringing, his culture, and his nobility "I" tradi- 
tion had a perspective not possible to many. He would 
have stood a bulwark for the best in Anglo-Saxon evolution. 
He would have been strong in — 

The strength that can not seels 

By deed or thought to hurt the weak. 

Of ROCKWOOD HOAR there can well be said what was 

written of another of Massachusetts' noble sons: 

He left the example of high powers nobly used and the remembrance of 

a spotless name. 



46 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mr. Bennet, of New York 

Mr. Speaker: It is said that Oliver Cromwell once, in 
answer to an inquiry from a portrait painter as to how he 
wished to be painted, said, "Paint me with the wart." Our 
friend I know possessed a similar spirit and was one of those 
who could best afford to exhibit it. Like my colleague from 
the Thirteenth district, I had before coming to Congress 
read and reread with pleasure, with interest, and with profit, 
the autobiography of the late Senator Hoar. His was one 
of those lives to which all look up, and when in the initial 
drawing of seats in the first session of this Fifty-ninth 
Congress I found mvself immediatelv in front of a orenial, 
dignified, courteous, fine-appearing man, it was one of the 
great additional pleasures of this service to find that that 
man was the sou of Senator Hoar. I appreciated it as a 
privilege at that time to be associated with one from such 
a distinguished ancestry, but it was only a matter of days 
before I learned to appreciate it as a pleasure, not onlv to 
associate with the son of Senator Hoar, but to form an 
acquaintance which ripened into friendship with Rock- 
WOOD Hoar. Our late friend was one of the most human 
men who ever came to Congress. I never met a man who 
excelled in doing the right thing in little things as did he- 
( >n the public side every thought was for his service here 
and for his service to his district. I had myself been 
educated in a school of practical politics, and yet it had 



Address of Mr. Bennet, of New York 47 

never occurred to me, nor to colleagues of mine similarly 
situated, to send the Congressional Record to the fire 
houses in my district because there the men would have 
time to read them, but Rockwood Hoar thought of that. 
He had a large delegation from his district, ladies, come 
here during Easter vacation. Any man with the means 
could have thought of the delightful lunch which he- 
gave them in the Capitol, but few besides Rockwood 
Hoar would have had the additional thought of giving 
to each one a session pass for the gallery signed with his 
own hand. He was loyal to his friends. There was a 
subject in which he and 1 were interested in which our 
views were in accord. One day coining into the Cham- 
ber he said, "My friend, Mr. So-and-so" (here to-day), 
"is to make some remarks on this subject this afternoon 
on the opposite side. You have given a good deal of 
thought to this subject,' and if you are mean enough to 
do it you can ask him questions and make suggestions 
that might tend to annoy or confuse him in some parts of 
it. If you do that, you will have me to deal with as long 
as we both stay here in Congress. He is sincere and 
entitled to his views and is entitled to have them go to 
his people in the way he wishes them, and I want to say 
to you that so far as you and I are concerned you inter- 
rupt him this afternoon at peril of our friendship." 

It is hardly necessary to say that after that, knowing Mr. 
Hoar, I did not attempt any but helpful interruptions. 

On that same subject he prepared a speech better than 
has ever been delivered in this branch of Congress in rela- 
tion to that subject. He prepared it with toil, labor, thought, 



48 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

and genius. After the final vote hail been taken he took it 
from his desk, handed it to me, and said, " Bennet, I wish 
you would read that." I did, and I said, "Hoar, win- didn't 
you make that speech ? It would have put von in the front 
ranks of the Members of this House in the Fifty-ninth Con- 
gress, no matter how long others have served." He said, 
"Those are my thoughts, my belief, and that is the way I 
voted, but the gentleman who led the opposition was from 
my own State and is my friend. In some ways I did not 
think he was being treated fairlv, and I did not desire to 
nor would I add to his defeat the humiliation of an attack 
from a member of his own delegation." 

Allusion has been made here to the occasion when Mr. 
Hoar was almost alone on this floor in a rising vote. I 
happened through the fact of sitting so close to him to be 
a very near witness on that occasion. He was a modest 
man, and it was a hard thing to do, and as I sat in my seat 
here I turned around and looked at him and saw him stand- 
ing in the aisle gripping the desk on either side, with every 
muscle tense, but still standing. 

( hie who has traveled through Massachusetts even to a 
limited extent can understand, I think, the spirit which 
animates such as our friend. It is the survival of the town 
meeting; it is reenforced by constant inspection of the me- 
morials of brave deeds. It is in a way helped by the very 
air of the State. We lose much here through the going of 
Rockwood Hoar. I am glad that the occasion occurred to 
which my colleague from the Thirteenth district alluded, 
when he was greeted with applause on taking the chair, and 
I am confident that when that applause came the most sur- 



Address of Mr. Bennet, of New York- 40 

prised man in the House was its recipient. He never fully 
realized his position in the hearts of his friends, and such a 
token as that helped somewhat, I am glad to know, his 
realization of how he stood. 

But while he was loyal to his friends mere friendship 
never led him on a vote. As my colleague from the Fif- 
teenth district has said, we all know that his vote was in 
accordance with his conscience. 

( >ne day the friend of his on the opposite side of tin- 
Chamber to whom I have referred came and asked me to 
vote with him on a matter, not of large moment and to 
which I had given, I regret to say, rather scanty attention. 
I promised to do so and I did so. After my name on the 
roll was called came Mr. Hoar's, and when his name was 
called he voted the opposite way. I turned to him in some 
surprise and said, "Why, Hoar, why didn't you vote with 
our friend and me?" He said, "Because you are wron«;;" 
and it would never have occurred to him to have done 
differently because of friendship. 

Allusion has been made to his distinguished ancestry, but 
there is a consideration which I desire to suggest. In a 
sense it is a handicap to a man to come here the son of a 
great man. His performances are measured by standards 
hard to live up to. Rockwood Hoar worshiped the mem- 
ory of his father, but I know upon one or two occasions 
when he was able to do something which his father had not 
been able to do that it was a source of some gratification to 
him to say, "This is the act of Rockwood Hoar." 

In that rounectiou I recall a little thing in which our 
colleague who has just left us, Mr. Rixey of Virginia, 
H. Doc. 806, 59-2 4 



50 Memorial Addressi %: Rockwood Hoar 

was concerned, when he and Mr. Hoar secured the 
small appropriation for a road oil the battlefield of Balls 
Bluff. Mr. Hoar had a tender regard for that place 
simplj because Massachusetts men had fought there. He 
had an added pride in getting the appropriation because 
his father had twice tried to and failed. 

We lose much, but those nearer and dearer lose more. 
I do not care, perhaps I could hardly trust myself, to 
speak upon that side, but I can simply say that the 
tenderness and solicitude which he evidenced here for his 
colleagues on both sides of the Chamber were magnified 
and intensified in his nearer relations. 

I last saw him in life, to recall particularly, on a 
beautiful summer evening toward the close of the last 
session, and we sat and planned our work when we 
should come back. He spoke with joy of his coming 
European trip, and then with equal joy of the work he- 
expected to do in the short session. The stars looked 
down, and in the beautiful balm of that summer evening 
there was no man who had a right to plan for the future 
better than he. We can not even guess as to these 
manifestations of Divine Providence. We know that he 
died in an assured belief, and we rejoice in that. The 
same stars look down now and the same balm of evening 
comes, but for Rockwood Hoar the mystery of what 
lies beyond those stars, what great hand guides the com- 
ing and the going of the balm of the evening has been 
solved. To him the window has been opened, the dawn 
has come, and he looks out not backward, but forward 
into life. 



Addn rj oj Mr. Olmsted, oj Pennsylvania 5] 



Address of Mr. Olmsted, of Pennsylvania 

Air. Speaker: Others, b) reason of longer acquaintance, 
better qualified than I, have already, with kindly thought 
and great felicity of expression, portrayed the life and 
character and services of our departed friend, but I can 
not forbear to add my tribute to the memory of one 
whom I had learned to love and esteem. 

Upon the organization of the Fifty-ninth Congress 
Rockwood Hoar was assigned to membership upon the 
Elections Committee of which I have the honor to be 
chairman. Mr. Hoar was, I think, particularly pleased 
with that assignment, as his father, the late distinguished 
Senator from Massachusetts, had, while in the House, held 
a similar committee position. In the published work which 
he has left behind him Senator Hoar takes some credit and 
expresses considerable pride in having been instrumental in 
lifting contests for seats in this House out of the reach of 
partisan control or influence and causing hearings before 
Elections Committees to bear resemblance to judicial 
proceedings, wherein questions of law and fact are deter- 
mined upon their merits without reference to the political 
affiliations of the parties thereto. His son was of the same 
disposition, and upon all matters coming before the com- 
mittee he brought to bear his clear, unbiased judgment, 
and aided, by his keen analysis of facts and quick and 
strong grasp of legal questions, the committee very much 



52 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

in reaching right conclusions. At the time of his death 
he was a member of a subcommittee charged with investi- 
gating and passing upon an important matter involving 
man}- difficult problems in which he was deeply interested 
and which he was extremely desirous of correctly and 
justly solving. 

We also served together as members of the committee 
appointed to represent the House of Representatives at the 
Franklin bicentenary celebration at Philadelphia. 

Thrown together constantly by committee association, 
there sprang up between us almost immediately a warm 
friendship, which I appreciated and enjoyed and shall ever 
gratefully remember. We were accustomed after the daily 

o 

sessions of the House to walk home frequently together, 
and thus I was enabled to gain greater insight of his life 
and character. He seemed to me to be as nearly without 
guile as any man I had known. He had a calm, judicial 
temperament and viewed all questions from an impartial 
standpoint. His mind was never fretted nor vexed by 
malice or hatred. He spoke ill of no man and was ever 
considerate and kind. While firm in his determination, 
particularly where anv question of right and wrong was 
involved, he was ever possessed of that sweet and gracious 
courtesy "which transmutes aliens into trusting friends, 
and gives its owner passport round the globe." 

It seemed to me, Mr. Speaker, that no man ever came 
to the House with fairer prospect of long, honorable, and 
distinguished sen-ice. But how soon it was ended. When 
he parted with us at the breaking up of the first session of 
this Congress he was in the best of spirits and apparently 



Address of Mr. Olmsted, of Pennsylvania 53 

in the best of health. Certainly it never occurred to him, 
nor to any of us, that before the constitutionally appointed 
time for reassembling he was to be laid away from mortal 
eye and another chosen to fill his seat. His untimely 
taking off in the very prime of life, in the height of his 
usefulness as citizen and statesman, reminds us once more 
of the uncertainty of all things here below. 

The world can ill afford to lose so good a man, but 
while his memory endures must be something better for 
his having- lived. 



54 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mr. Murphy, of Missouri 

Mr. Speaker: The frail body is a vehicle carrying us 
down the pathway and through the avenues of life to no 
uncertain destination. Sooner or later, Mr. Speaker, you 
and I and all of us will reach the end of our journey and 
be called before the great presiding officer, there to report 
our compliance with or disregard for the rules written upon 
tablets of stone. Can we answer that we have had no other 
God save him alone? Can we answer that we have loved 
our neighbor as ourselves? Can we say, "Thou hast com- 
manded, we have obeyed?" The taking from our midst of 
one we loved is to again remind us of the uncertainties of 
life. Can it be that a time was selected and Rockwood 
Hoar exalted to impress us with the nearness of our 
approach to the great beyond? 

It was my pleasure, Mr. Speaker, to serve with Mr. Hoar 
Upon committee, and I had every opportunity to judge his 
very nature. No man could but be impressed with his 
kind and gentle disposition, his absolute fairness, his hon- 
esty of purpose, his high qualities of statesmanship, and his 
firm devotion to his duties, his country, his flag, and his 
God. He loved all mankind as his neighbor; he had a 
pleasant smile and a kind word for every being. Every 
inch of him was a man. I believe he lived a life that God 
intended all men should live. 



Address of Mr. Murphy, oj Missouri 55 

We arc taught that no man is perfect. If this be true, 
the imperfections of RoCKWOOD Hoar were beyond the 
discernment of the human. Days and months and years 
will come and go, but the services of Rockwood Hoar are 

recorded in the history of his country, then- to perpetuate 
his memory forever. And when in after years we turn 
back the pages of time, it will be said of him that he 
brought sunshine into the world and it is better for his 
having lived. He will be missed in the committee; he 
will be missed in this House. His place can never be filled 
in the hearts of his friends. 

When I left this city last summer, he was the last to say 
"good-by." Little did I think it was to say good-by for- 
ever. No, Mr. Speaker, I do not believe it was forever. 
He died, no doubt, as he wished to die, in the service of 
his countrv. He died as he lived — a man. 



c6 Memorial .Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mr. Chaney, of Indiana 

Mr. SPEAKER: Massachusetts has played a prominent 
part in American civilization. From my earliest recollec- 
tion our schoolbooks, our declamations, and our stories 
came from New England. The home of American litera- 
ture was there. We looked toward Boston Harbor as the 
early settlers did to Southampton and Liverpool. About 
old Cambridge town and Concord repose the remains of my 
father's ancestors who served their modest part in the 
primitive times of the Great Republic. Old South Church 
and Faneuil Hall are dear to the American name. It is no 
disparagement to Virginia, the mother of Presidents, and 
the home of my maternal ancestors, the Crawfords, to say 
that the fire of patriotic devotion to a wider liberty burned 
fervently in the ( )ld Bay State, and that her sons always 
marched abreast of progress. At no period of American his- 
tory is there a blank page for Massachusetts. The Hancocks, 
the Adamses, the Warrens, and Paul Revere are among the 
first of liberty's heroes. The Websters, the Sumners, the 
Wilsons, and the family of Rockwood Hoar embellish 
the achievements of the United States. They all had the 
reputation of doing all things well. They lived in the 
years which spoke to the centuries to come. Under their 
ringing strokes science was ascertained and out of supersti- 
tion there came revealed religion. Puritanic they were, 
but generally open to reason and conviction. To pro- 



Address of Mr. ( Aaney, of Indiana 57 

nounce a eulogy upon them is but to recite a page from 
every chapter of our glorious history. 

To Rockwood Hoar nature and an honorable ancestry 
seemed to have created a choice environment, and to have 
marked out a lengthy career. 

An ancestor of his signed every charter of American 
liberty. A distinguished father had set a i^reat example. 
His education was well planned and faithfully improved. 
In the public schools of Worcester he caught the inspiration 
of genius and the true American spirit. In far-famed Har- 
vard he became a bachelor and master of arts. Although 
bom in 1855, he yet succeeded to the bar in 1879. Chosen 
assistant district attorney for tire middle district of his State 
from 1884 to 1887, his services were so well and favorably 
remembered that he became the district attorney from 1899 
to 1905. In Iris community he took the active part of a 
useful man and was universally regarded as a conservator 
of the public good. 

He and I came into the Congress of the United States 
together, and each of us succeeded a worthy Democrat. 
It being the first term to touch elbows with the lawmakers 
of the Union, we naturally stood at the distance of the 
discreet observer. "A fellow-feeling makes us wondrous 
kind," and so we became fast friends. I esteemed him as 
a man who lived as mothers would have their sons live, 
for he was faithful and true; and I looked upon him as a 
man who died as fathers would have their sons die, har- 
nessed to duty, faithfully working out an honorable destiny. 
July was in his sunny heart, October was the friendship in 
his hand. 



58 Me7iiorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

Some men in political life, and everywhere else for that 
matter, see only the passing error in things done. Rock- 
wood Hoar observed the supreme purpose in transpiring 
events. There are those who have picked their paths at 
the mountain's base so long that they see only the waning 
sun. The subject of our sketch breathed the morning 
ozone and watched the early orb of day brightening earth's 
duties and beauties. He was highly regarded for his 
moral and intellectual worth in Worcester. He was ardent 
and thorough in every duty and lent an honorable hand 
to every good cause among his neighbors. 

In Congress he rendered distinguished service to his 
country on the Committee on Revision of the Laws, and 
his voice and vote were always given to legislation in 
recognition of the services of the soldiers who saved the 
country whole and the flag so glorious. 

While living in comparison with a distinguished name, 
he yet did not shine by reflected light. He had capacitv, 
ability, and great energy and honorable ambition. He- 
had practical judgment and stood close to the people. 
He served well his city and his county at home, and lie 
served his district and country well here. 

His associates throughout his career from his earliest 
days in college to the last hour of his life were men 
worthy of an exalted life and a splendid manhood. It 
i> said that the good things of the universe can not he 
defined. Neither can intellect or soul lie defined. And, 
of course, immortality is entirely beyond human compar- 
ison and comprehension. The things that make for good 
are nevertheless understood and appreciated. The soul 



Address of Mr. Chaney, of Indiana 59 

is a star which dwells apart and commands individual at- 
tention. The personality of RoCKWOOD Hoar reel 1 forced 
his mental calculation. He was original in thought and 
action. He contributed to the subject under considera- 
tion. Ik- did not seek to dominate, but to elucidate. 
This is a quality which requires industry, study, and dis- 
passionate reflection. With him oratory was not in the 
rhetorical roundness of a period, but in the aptness of 
the thought and the pleasing persuasion of its application. 

It is not greatness I would attribute to out friend, but 
usefulness and a common importance belonging to a 
useful life. "To be, and not to seem, was this man's 
wisdom." 

Cut down by the grim and unreasoning reaper at the 
milepost where great and good manhood scarcely touches 
high twelve, he vet lived a life and in a time wherein 
his fifty years wrought a century of accomplishment. In 
high ideals he honored his day and generation ; under 
the light of splendid example he nourished his house- 
hold, and in manly devotion to duty he rounded out a 
life of satisfying success. 

Man is no star, but a quick coal 

( if mortal fire ; 
Who blows it not, nor doth control 

A faint desire, 
Let his own ashes choke his soul. 



60 Memorial Addresses; Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mr. Macon, of Arkansas 

Mr. Speaker: I did not have the pleasure of knowing 
the distinguished and lovable subject of this memorial 
occasion until I met him at the beginning of the present 
Congress, and I account myself greatly the loser because I 
was not fortunate enough to know him at an earlier period 
of his life, for after being intimately associated with him as 
a member of the Committee on the Revision of the Laws of 
the United States for seven long months I was constrained 
to believe that the world had been made better by the 
worthy life he had lived, and hence all who had been denied 
an acquaintance with him had been deprived of many of 
the social pleasures that come to mankind through the ave- 
nues of intimate association with the earth's noblest and 
gentlest sons. From the first moment of our acquaintance 
I was firmlv impressed with the fact that a gentleman born 
and bred, in whom there was no guile, had joined the forces 
of legislative life, one who fairly lived the sacred sentiment 
of that grand old song that was sung in the long ago by 
stainless tongue upon Judea's lofty heights: "On earth 
peace, good will toward man." He was blessed with an 
open, honest face; a bright, intelligent eye; a mellow, win- 
ning voice; a proud, manly bearing; a courageous, but sweet 
spirit that was as full of fraternalism as anyone it was ever 
my privilege to know, a fraternalism that was intended by 
its Creator to be as free and as pure as the waters that flow 



Address of Mr. Macon, of Arkansas 61 

from the fountains of eternal life, as harmonious among 
men as the notes of the song bird that are warbled forth as 
he rises from his night of rest and flaps the morning sun 
rays into a thousand glittering gems, as sweet and as sacred 
as the music that is flung by angelic fingers from the strings 
of angelic harps. 

The fraternalism that animated and controlled his every 
act would have stayed the murderous hand of a sin-cursed 
Cain, would have stifled the impetuous words of an angry 
Lot, would have prevented the theft of the birthright from 
innocent Esau, would have stopped the sale of Joseph into 
Egypt by his brethren, and would have brought a blush of 
shame to the cheek of unrighteous Saul to have even thought 
of hurling a javelin at the head of the youthful and sweet- 
spirited shepherd boy of the plains. The kind of fraternalism 
that found lodgment in his noble breast, though often and 
bitterly assailed, thank God, has survived the tyranny of 
tyrants, the cruelties of bigot kings, the vices of avarice and 
greed, and the inhumanity of man to man. It has put bread 
into the mouths of millions of hungry soids and has clothed 
as many tattered forms. Ah, Mr. Speaker, if such frater- 
nalism as that that guided and controlled the acts and words 
of the lamented Rockwood Hoar was lived and practiced by 
the peoples of the world every hovel would become a palace 
and every man and woman a saint. Duty seemed to be his 
only taskmaster, and faithfully and efficiently did he meet 
and discharge every obligation that was laid upon him by 
that exacting overseer. When assigned to the Committee 
on the Revision of the Laws, he discovered that its work 
had been sadly neglected for several years, and hence he 



02 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

found more than a double task before him if he and his 
colleagues on the committee were to revise the laws during 
the life of the Fifty-ninth Congress. It was his ambition 
that ere the gavel fell to tell of the close of the Congress 
that the laws would have been revised and the work of the 
committee ended. He therefore entered upon the duties 
before him with great fidelity, energy, and superior intelli- 
gence, and never did he fail or falter in his work, no matter 
how many or how long the hours of labor or how volumi- 
nous <>r arduous the task. His Congressional career was 
short, but it was as successful, as complete, and useful as 
that of any Member of that body of which I have knowledge 
whose term of service was not longer than his. 

I therefore beg of his constituents to know that in his 
election no mistake was made and that in honoring him 
they honored themselves to a high degree. He was alike 
the son of an illustrious sire and of a proud State, but 
the knowledge of that fact did not seem to make him 
feel that he was any better than the humblest citizen 
of our broad land, if that citizen was only honest. He- 
despised bigotry, and pharisaical professions were abomi- 
nations in his sight. He possessed none of the elements 
of the demagogue and under all conditions dared to do 
the right. He was ever courteous, generous, and kind. 
While his carriage was that of a proud man, his head 
was never held so high as not to see the humblest of 
his fellows as he passed them by. As indicated at the 
beginning of my remarks, I was not acquainted with his 
early life, but if his boyhood and early manhood are to 
be judged by that period of his life familiar to me, I am 



Address of Mr. Macon, of Arkansas 63 

constrained to believe that no act of his ever brought 
sorrow to a loving mother's heart or a flush of shame to 

a proud father's face. I am sure that he impressed himself 
upon everyone and everything with which he had to do in 
a most favorable manner, and, in rav judgment, if he had 
not been stricken down in the flower of his manhood 
he would have made an imprint upon the institutions of 
his country that the relentless forces of time and tide 
only could have effaced. He was too broad of mind and 
great of soul to be a petty partisan or a narrow sectionalist, 
and in none of the many conversations that I had with 
him did I ever hear him utter an unkind word concernin» 

o 

an}- section of our Union or any of its citizens. While 
he was supremely proud of his native State, he did not 
regard it as the wheel that moved the world or its capital 
city the hub around which it revolved. 

He believed in the rights of individuals, communities 
and .States, and he thought that every individual, commu- 
nity, and State, no matter where domiciled or located, 
possessed the very same rights and was entitled to the verv 
same considerations. Little did I think, when he gave my 
Hand a warm, friendly clasp at the close of the last session 
of Congress, that it was for the last time. But the fates 
decreed that it should be, for only a few short months after 
our friendly parting the sad news came to me that he had 
departed this life. lint, sir, I am in a measure consoled by 
the thought that he so lived while upon this earth that 
when he came to die he did not go to his grave like a 
"galley slave, scourged to his dungeon," but, comforted 
and sustained by thoughts of noble deeds well performed, 



64 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

he was able "to draw the draperies of his couch about him 

and lie down to pleasant dreams." 

Mr. Speaker, truly a just man has been called to his well- 
earned reward. Peace to his ashes and joy to his soul. 

( )h, may the shaft that keeps silent watch over his sacred 
tomb be able to withstand the tempest's fiercest blow; mar 
the sun shine brightest above the spot where lies his 
precious remains, and may flowers sweetly bloom around 
his untimely grave until time, in its last revolution, breaks 
over eternity's shores, and his .yreat soul rest in the bosom 
of his Lord forever and forever, is the earnest prayer of his 
southern friends. 



Address of Mr. Butler, o/Tennesi 65 



Address of Mr. Butler, of Tennessee 

Mr. Speaker: It is with feelings of pleasure mingled 
with sadness that I unite with others in this House in 
paying just tribute to the memory of Hon. RoCKWOOD 
Hoar, late Representative from the State of Massachusetts, 
whose life and character we are here to commemorate and 
whose death we deplore. 

Although my personal acquaintance with him was lim- 
ited and of short duration, I esteem it as a high privilege 
to unite with others who had known him longer and 
better in commemorating his main- virtues. 

I first met the distinguished Congressman at the begin- 
ning of the first session of the Fifty-ninth Congress, and 
although strangers at the time, our acquaintance soon 
ripened into warm personal friendship. 

During that session I had the honor to serve with him 
on the Committee on Elections No. 2, before which con- 
tests of a very heated and highly partisan character were 
pending. Although we differed as widely as the north 
pole from the .south on questions of public policy, he 
proved himself to be a man who could rise above the 
clamor of party prejudices and base his judgment on 
important questions arising before the committee on truth 
and justice, with an eye single and alone to the right 
between the opposing parties. 
H. Doc. S06, 59-2 5 



i ii i Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

With marked ability and fairness he examined the 
evidence with a view of eliciting the truth. This accom- 
plished, his action was prompt and decisive. 

His service as a Member of this House began with my 
own, and during the first session he was prompt in his 
attendance, active in the discharge of his duties, and dis- 
played the ability and courage worth}- of the high position 
he occupied in the councils of the nation to which his 
people had honored him. 

In his untimely death this House has lost one c. f its 
most useful Members, his district a Representative 
whom the people were justly proud, and the nation a states- 
man who promised to become one of its most brilliant. 

His political career was of short duration, but during 
that time he showed himself to be a man of the highest 
integrity and ability, a gentleman in the true sense of the 
word, who was destined to carve his name high up on the 
roll of honor. 

We join with his family and those who knew him best, 
as well as the nation at large, in mourning his untimely 
death. 



Address of Mr. Lovering, oj Massachusetts 67 



Address of Mr. Lovering, of Massachusetts 

Mr. Speaker: It is not my purpose to measure his 
worth; that is better known than I can state. But, ray 
friends, let it be our pleasure, as it is our duty, to hold 
up the life and services of Mr. Hoar as a noble and 
worthy example of what the human character is capable 
of accomplishing, so that it may be to the young men of 
this country the rich incentive to patriotism, honor, and 
that higher life which is the mark of every true American 
citizen. 

Mr. Speaker, we gather to do mournful reverence to 
our late colleague, Rockwood Hoar. 

His life was all too short to fill out the full measure of 
its promise. He was a man of whom it could be said 
that, had he lived, he would have trod the paths of great- 
ness, whither his footsteps were surelv and steadily leading 
him. 

Born of an illustrious family, distinguished in the history 
of our Government, it may vet be said that he stood upon 
his own intellectual feet and carved out an independent 
career worthy of his great inheritance. 

His nobilitv of character, his determined purpose to 
solve the great problems of human government, his 
intuition of common sense, and his untiring devotion to 
the duties of life, public and private, constitute a legacy 
that enriches us all. 



68 Memorial Addresses: Roekwood Hoar 

In every relation of life he was the loving, courteous, 
and honorable gentleman. 

Tried by all the best instincts of human nature, his 
heart rang true to his fellow-men. 

I would that 1 could borrow from his own storehouse 
of choice English appropriate terms to express the senti- 
ments that rise in my heart and press for utterance. 



Address of Mr. Gillctt, of Massachusetts 69 



Address of Mr. Gillett, of Massachusetts 

Mr. Speaker: The life and character of our late col- 
league have been already so fully set forth that I can not 
hope to add anything of value, but my regard for him was 
so strong that I can not be silent on this occasion. 

He came here to find a cordial prepossession in his favor, 
for he was elected to Congress just as his father finished 
his long and distinguished service, and I think all men 
cherished the hope that the magnificent public record of 
the father might be taken up and long continued by the 
son. We do not in this countrv yield honors to heredity. 
We are a new people, democratic and informal, and part of 
our creed has been to give recognition only to the merit of 
the individual, not to his descent. We have had no sym- 
pathy with the European habit of admiring most the 
youngest branches of the family tree, of honoring the latest 
scion of a house more than the originator, and regulating 
respect and giving precedence to men according to their 
distance from the founder of a family. On the contrary, 
we "laugh at the claims of long descent," and give most 
honor to the man who by his own effort and achievement 
has brought luster to his name. Certainly our creed seems 
most logical and reasonable. That member of a family 
who is first able to raise himself to eminence above his 
fellows is most likely to have the genius or the energy or 
the masterful will power which all men admire. And his 



jo Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

descendants, enjoying the opulence and the respect which 
his exertions won for them, relieved from the need of 
struggle by his success, are likely to dissipate and lose in 
ease and idleness the virile qualities which they may have 
inherited from him. They will naturally make more 
agreeable carpet knights, they will shine better in courts, 
and please better a society which values only elegance and 
courtesy; but the iron will disappear from the blood, and 
dissipation and corruption are too likely to become their 
main distinction. Human nature is too indolent to retain 
long its vigor except under the spur of necessity. 

"What shall I do that mv son mav make a figure in the 
world?" a nobleman once asked a lord chancellor of 
England. " I know of but one way, my lord," was the 
reply. " Give him parts and poverty." And so the tend- 
ency of a rich and distinguished family is to deteriorate 
and degenerate, and the farther from the fountain head the 
less likely to deserve respect. 

< >ur public opinion goes to the other extreme from 
Europe. Rough power, mere success, we value most. We 
idealize the individual. Humble birth, unfavorable sur- 
roundings, an early struggle against oppressive obstacles, 
are the surest claims to general admiration and popularity. 
We are ton busy and practical to pay much heed to shrink- 
in- and delicate virtues or perhaps to sufficiently value 
culture and courtesy and refinement; we worship power 
and practical achievement. It is unusual with us to give 
honor t<> successive generations of a family. 

\nd yet we are not without sentiment. I think we all 
rejoice when the scion of an honored but decayed house 



Address of Mr. (,'///,//, of Massachusetts 71 

regains ancestral honors or wins new distinction. We vote 
with an added interest, not of reason, but of sentiment, foi 
the man whose grandfather we have voted for before. We 
all exult with the broadening girdle of Scott's White Lady 
of Avenel. And so we all take more than common delight, 
and our judgment and our sentiment alike are captivated, 
when we see the talents and character of a great father 
renewed and perpetuated in a worthy son. Our late col- 
league gave promise of that attractive inheritance. He 
came to find among us partial friends, and in his short 
association with us he gave us reason to expect, as well as 
hope, that the duty to which three generations of eminent 
public service inspired and pledged him would be faithfully 
and honorably and adequately performed. 

What would most impress you on first acquaintance was 
that he was a courteous, cultured gentleman. You might 
suspect that the ordinary process was going on and that the 
rngged strength of the founder of the family was being 
refined awav, but a closer knowledge would assure you 
that though not obtrusive the firmness was still there; that 
though o-entle he was resolute and could be obstinate; that 
the fiber of his brain was tough and unimpaired, and that 
there was in him, when roused, the stuff of which martyrs 
are made. Yet there was about him, and to me it was one of 
his most charming characteristics, a delicacy and refinement 
which you never forgot. The steel was of so fine a temper 
that the edge was keen, but there was a solid weight of 
metal behind it. While yielding and accommodating in 
small matters, yet you soon discovered that his will and his 
conscience were both alert and that he would be immovable 



7- Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

when either prompted him to resistance. He was indus- 
trious and ambitions in the performance of his dnties here, 
and gave evidence of the qualities to make him popular, 
influential, and most useful. 

We have in Massachusetts two notable families where 
have been transmitted for generations from father to son 
not only talent, and character, and capacity for public serv- 
ice, but, more remarkable, the virile energy and vigor and 
enterprise which, in this competitive age, are indispensable 
for large success. Our late colleague was the last male rep- 
resentative in his generation of one of these. Such fami- 
lies are a rich possession for any Commonwealth. We have 
sentiment enough in practical and busy Massachusetts to 
prize and honor them, and we trust that coming generations 
may renew their fame and increase our pride. 



Address oj Mr. Grosvenor, of Ohio 73 



Address of Mr. Grosvenor, of Ohio 

Mr. Speaker: Death with its merciless hand has not 
stricken a more worthy Member of the House of Repre- 
sentatives since I had the honor to be a Member of it than 
Rockwooi) Hoar. He came from Massachusetts. lie was 

the son of one of the most distinguished men of Massachu- 
setts, George Frisbie Hoar, who as lawyer, literary man, 
patriot, and statesman had few equals and no superior in 
the Senate of the United States. His long service to his 
country made him an honored leader of opinion, and so it 
was reasonable for us to expect, when his son came to take 
his seat in the House of Representatives, more than the 
average of excellence, and we were not disappointed. He- 
had a mind as sharp and incisive as the mind of his father. 
He was laborious, industrious, and clear-headed. He struck 
at the marrow of questions and studied them with diligence 
and aptitude. 

As a member of the Committee on the Revision of the 
Laws he showed especial fitness and especial adaptation. 
He was making his wav rapidly to a high position in the 
House of Representatives. He exhibited the elements of 
mental accuracv — incisiveness, clearness, and brilliancy. 

I knew nothing of his history prior to his appearance 
here, but it did not take any of us long to discover that there 
had come amongst us a man destined for high position. 

A more untimely death has not occurred in the House of 
Representatives in recent years. 



74 Memorial . Iddresses: Rockwood Hoar 

I took delight in talking with him. His knowledge of 
literature, history, events of the past was of a high grade 
and his conversational powers of the very best. 

It ma}' be said of him that he exhibited a possibility fully 
equal to the high position attained bv his father. He was 
genial, pleasant, considerate of others, was popular in the 
House of Representatives, and his popularity was of that 
stanch and endurable character that would have made him 
a prominent and distinguished personage in any assemblage 
'if men. 

His .State has suffered an irreparable loss. The House of 
Representatives can well mourn the loss of a man who bid 
fair td lie so valuable. His associates may well pay this 
tribute to his memory. There was every reason to believe 
that he woidd be a conspicuous member of the Massachu- 
setts delegation, and I join in this brief and imperfect tribute 
to a man whose death I consider not only a national lint a 
personal loss. 

FURTHER ACTION OF THE HOUSE. 

Mr. Washburn. Mr. Speaker, because of the fact that 
several Members of the House who wish to be heard on 
this occasion are unavoidably absent, I ask unanimous 
consent that general leave to print be "ranted for a 
period of ten days. 

The Speaker pro tempore (Mr. McNary). The gen- 
tleman from Massachusetts asks unanimous consent that 
leave to print be granted for ten days. Is there objection? 

There was no objection; and it was so ordered. 



Proceedings in the Senate 75 



PROCEEDINGS IN THE SENATE 

Tuesday, December ./, igo6. 
Mr. Cuelom. Mr. President, I ask that the resolutions of 

the House of Representatives relative to the death of the 
late Representative Rockwood Hoar of Massachusetts may 
be laid before the Senate. 

The Vice-President. The Chair lays before the Senate 
resolutions of the House of Representatives, which will be 
read. 

The Secretary read the resolutions, as follows: 

In the House of Representatives, 

December 3, 1906. 
Resolved, That the House has heard with profound sorrow of the death 
of Hon. Rockwood Hoar, a Representative from the State of Massachu- 
setts. 

Resolved. That as a further mark of respect to the memory of the Rep- 
resentative whose death has been announced this House do new adjourn. 

Mr. LODGE. Mr. President, I offer a resolution for present 
consideration. 

The Vice-President. The Senator from Massachusetts 
submits a resolution, which will be read. 

The resolution was read, and unanimously agreed to, as 

follows-: 

Resolved, That the Senate has heard with deep sensibility of the death 
of Hon. Rockwood Hoar, a Representative from the State of Massachu- 
setts. 

Mr. Lodge. Mr. President, I also offer another resolution. 

The Vice-President. The Senator from Massachusetts 

proposes an additional resolution, which will be read. 



76 Proceedings in the Senate 

The resolution was read, as follows: 

Resolved, That ~s an additional mark of respect to the memory of the 
deceased the Senate do now adjourn. 

The resolution was unanimously agreed to; and (at 2 
o'clock and 55 minutes p. 111.) the Senate adjourned until 
to-morrow, Wednesday, Decembers, igo6, at 12 o'clock 
meridian. 

SATURDAY, February 23, '90J- 

The Vice-President laid before the Senate the follow- 
ing resolutions from the House of Representatives, which 

were read: 
. In Tin: House of Representatives, 

February in, 1907. 

Resolved, That the business of the House be now suspended that 
opportunity may be given for tributes to the memory of Hon. Rockwood 
I [< 1 \K, late a Member of this House from the State of Massachusetts. 

.V olved, That as a particular mark of respect to the memory of the 
deci ased, and in recognition of his distinguished public career, the House 
at the conclusion of the memorial exercises of the day shall stand 
adjourned. 

Resolved, That the Clerk communicate these resolutions to the Senate. 

Resolved, That the Clerk send a copy of these resolutions to the family 
of the deceased 

Mr. Lodge. I send to the desk resolutions, Mr. Presi- 
dent, which I ask may be read. 

The Vice-President. The Senator from Massachusetts 
proposes the following resolutions, which will be read by 
the Secretary. 

The resolutions were read and unanimously agreed to, 
as follows: 

Resolved, That the Senate has heard with profound sorrow of the death 
of Hon. Rockwood Hoar, late a Member of the House of Representatives 
from tile State of Massachusetts. 

Resolved, That the business of the Senate be now suspended in order 
that a fitting tribute may be paid to his memory. 



Address of Mr. Lodge, of Massachusetts 77 



MEMORIAL ADDRESSES 



Address of Mr. Lodge, of Massachusetts 

Air. President: Only two years ago I spoke here in 
commemoration of the life and services of my revered 
and distinguished colleague, Senator Hoar. To-day I am 
called upon to perform the same sad service in honor of 
his son, who died last November, after much suffering, 
at his home in Worcester. Senator Hoar died in the 
fullness of years, after a service in Congress covering 
more than the lifetime of a generation. RoCKWOOD Hoar 
died in the prime of life, just as his public service here 
was beginning. He was the last of his generation, and 
for the first time in more than seventy years there is no 
man of his name and family in the public life of Mas- 
sachusetts, and for the first time in more than forty years 
there is no one of his race representing Massachusetts in 
either House of Congress. 

Rockwood Hoar felt always the responsibility of this 
tradition of public service which belonged to his family 
from the seventeenth century down to the present time. 
He graduated from Harvard, worked hard at his profes- 
sion, where he won early distinction, was occupied with 
all the cares and pleasures which an active life and a 
happy home imposed upon him; but the call to do his 



Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

share of public work and play his part in the life of his 
time, that call which came to him out of the past, in- 
separable from his "birth and state," never fell upon 
dull ears. He responded to every command, whether in 
city or in State. He served on the staff of two govern- 
ors, and did hard and much-needed work in that position 
during the Spanish war. He was elected district attorney 
for his county and achieved there great success, bringing 
to the office the untiring industry and exacting conscien- 
tiousness which were among his most conspicuous qual- 
ities. Then he was elected to Congress, and had just 
begun to show here the same ability and earnestness 
which he had exhibited in other fields when he was 
taken from us and from the public service, which he so 
valued and enjoyed, by an untimely death. 

Rockwood Hoar was endowed with all the attributes of 
mind and character which a representative of the American 
people should possess. He was a thorough American, born 
and bred in Massachusetts, where his ancestors had lived 
and worked for more than two hundred and fifty years. 
Love of countrv, patriotism in its highest sense, was born 
with him, was his inheritance, was bone of his bone and 
flesh of his flesh. He was well trained, well educated, well 
read, a sound and able lawyer, a man of entire honesty and 
courage of sensitive honor and unblemished character. 
With gll these qualities of mind and heart, his success in 
larger field of public usefulness just opening before him 
was assured. 

1 have spoken of Mr. Hoar only in his public capacity, 
as it is fittest to speak here and on this occasion. But I 



Address <>/ Mr. Lodge, of Massachusetts 79 

can not refrain from expressing ni\ own sense of a great 
personal loss in the death of one for whom I felt an affec- 
tion which I like to think was returned. 1 had known 
Rockwood Hoar for many years, lmt our meetings had 
been casual and at long intervals. Recently, however, cir- 
cumstances had brought us closely together, and the inti- 
mate relations I had had with his father were transferred 
to the son. Then I came to realize fully his main- fine 
qualities and to fee' how worthily he maintained and, if 
his life were spared, how finely he would illustrate the hon- 
ored and historic name he bore. It was to me a great grati- 
fication to be associated with him here in Washington, to 
see him starting so fairly to fulfill all the hopes which those 
who knew him best cherished for him. But that future was 
not to be his. " He has outsoared the shadow of our night," 
and we can only in halting words express our sense of the 
loss which has come to the country and to the State which 
commanded his devotion and of the sorrow which has be- 
fallen his friends — the only sorrow he ever caused them. 



8o Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mr. Curtis, of Kansas 

Mr. President: This hour has been set apart that we 
may pay tribute to the memory of a man of distinguished 
lineage and of notable public service. It was my privilege 
to serve with him in the House of Representatives, where I 
learned to appreciate his devotion to duty aud his manly 
regard for the principles of honor, truth, and worth. 

Rockwood Hoar came from a long line of distinguished 
ancestors. The family in England had both substance and 
established positions before events in America were con- 
trolled by European hands. For two hundred and fifty 
years the family has been an honored one in New England, 
and for more than fifty years it has had a most extraordinary 
share in shaping public affairs for the entire country. For 
five generations backward Rockwood Hoar was descended 
from an unbroken line of patriots and illustrious men. 
Two of these ancestors — father and son — were side by side 
at Concord aiding in our struggle for independence. His 
grandfather was a noted lawyer and a prominent Member 
of Congress. His father outstripped all of his name in the 
race for honor and won for himself the plaudits of the world. 
His father's mother was a daughter of Roger Sherman, a 
distinguished signer of the Declaration of Independence, 
whose other descendants have written their names large 
upon the pages of our history. 



Address of Mr. Curtis, of Kansas 81 

From an ancestry like this ROCKWOOD Hoar could 
inherit nothing but the most profound conceptions of duty, 
the most enlightened modes of thought, and the most con- 
servative methods of action. Born of parents most singu- 
larly upright and learned, hedged in on all sides by inherit- 
ances of speech, thought, and manner, Rockwohh Hoab 
could be naught else than a distinguished character. 

In his own right, supported of course by the impregnable 
virtues of his inheritance, Rockwood Hoar took a dis- 
tinguished place among his fellows. As graduate of Har- 
vard he was well grounded for life's severest struggles and 
most admirably equipped for a successful career in any line 
of thought or industry. He chose the law and honored it. 
His judgment was methodical, precise, and sound, and 
n the faithful performance of a trust he was surpassed 
by none. Beginning in January, 1S99, he served six 
vears as district attorney in his home district, laying- 
down this honor to accept the greater honor of a seat 
11 the House of Representatives of the United States, 
jeing sent thereto from a district which for three previ- 
ous terms had elected men in opposition to his political 
principles. The confidence of his friends was rewarded 
by the able work he performed as district attorney, and 
the single session he served in the higher work of 
Congressional labor gave ample proof of promise and of 
power. His interest in educational affairs is shown by 
the fact that he was at the time of his death a trustee 
of Clark University. Such was the career he worked 
out for himself in the twenty-six short vears from the 
H. Doc. S06, 59-2 6 



82 Memorial Addresses: Rockwood Hoar 

date of his admission to the bar. Verily he shone by 
no reflected light, and could he have been spared might 
have won an equal place with his distinguished father. 
His father was great in his spiritual discernment ; Rock- 
wood Hoar in this respect followed closely in the foot- 
steps of his illustrious sire. The father was courteous, 
kind, and obliging; the son had all these qualities in 
an eminent degree. The father lived a long and a most 
eventful career, dying in a ripe old age ; the son lived 
a vigorous, eventful life, climbing each vear to higher 
heights, but was cut off in the vers- prime of life, before 
the seeds of promise had full time to bud and flower 
and bring forth the rich fruitage of a grand and powerful 
life. Rockwood Hoar made but few speeches in his 
short Congressional career, but in those that have been 
preserved he exhibited the tenderest regard for the 
sentiments of others and the single desire to contribute 
something which would in reality illuminate the subject. 
His rugged common sense and his experience with a 
great number of vital questions gave his utterances upon 
great questions a power they would otherwise not have 
gained, and foreshadowed a greater power when he 
should have had a longer service and the wider confi- 
dence of his associates. Rockwood Hoar brought into 
the House high ideals of public life and unswerving 
loyalty to public duty; these were his compass and guide 
throughout the short period of his service. 

In his private life he was above all reproach and with 
his friends the kindliest of men. So passed from us a 
man of unblemished and noble character — a man of 



Address of Mr. Curtis, of Kansas 83 

varied and great abilities. He did a great work without 
living out the fullest span of human life. In his native 
State, where his honors were most largely won, his 
demise was universally regretted and deplored, and in 
the Congress of the United States his departure was a 
blow. It was unexpected, and to his fellows, who were 
just coming to know him as a man and as a friend, his 
death brought sorrow and regret. So died an honest, 
sincere, and upright man, a man well fitted for public 
life, and who in every relation of life discharged to the 
fullest his duties to himself, to his family, to his State, 
and to the country at latge. 



s,| Memorial . Iddresses: Rockwood Hoar 



Address of Mr. Crane, of Massachusetts 

Mr. President: Rockwood Hoar served but one ses- 
sion in the House of Representatives. The tributes paid 
to him by his associates show that during that brief time 
he had not only won their affectionate regard, but had 
impressed them to a remarkable degree with his industry, 
ability, and sterling worth. They have spoken with ten- 
derness and evident sincerity of his lovable personality, of 
his courage and spirit of independence, of the high ideals 
which governed his life, and of his unyielding devotion 
to duty. Mr. Hoar was fitted by education and b\ capacity 
for work for the position to which he was chosen by those 
who knew him well and among whom all his life had 
been spent. 

He was nominated unanimously by the Republicans of 
the Third Massachusetts district as their candidate for 
Representative in Congress in 1904, and elected by a large 
majority. The fact that two years later he was again 
nominated without opposition showed how satisfactory his 
service had been to his constituents and gave reasonable 
assurance that he would have had an opportunity for ex- 
tended service in a field that was so attractive to him and 
where he could have been relied upon to do faithful and 
efficient work. 

He took great interest in everything pertaining to the 
welfare of the regfion in which he lived. He could always 



Address of Mr. Crane, of Massachusetts 85 

be depended upon to give freely of his time and ability, 
not alone in official positions, but wherever he saw that he 
could be of use to the city and county of Worcester. For 
four years he was a member of the city council, and during 
the last year of such service was president of that body. 
From 1S99 to 1905 he was district attorney of the county 
of Worcester and had formerly served for three years as its 
assistant district attorney. He brought to the discharge of 
his duties in these positions thoroughness and painstaking 
effort and exhibited at all times that courage and independ- 
ence which so impressed his colleagues in the House of 
Representatives during his brief service with them. 

He was also interested in military affairs and was an aid- 
de-camp on the staff of Governor Oliver Ames from 1887 to 
1890. Seven years later he accepted a position on the staff 
of Governor Roger Wolcott as judge-advocate. 

Rockwood Hoar was descended from men who had ren- 
dered distinguished service to State and nation. It was just 
at the end of his father's long and illustrious life that he 
became a Member of Congress. He was naturally ambi- 
tious and rejoiced in the opportunity which had come to 
him to bear some part in shaping national legislation. His 
friends knew that he was well equipped for the work which 
he undertook with so much satisfaction and enthusiasm. 
Thev hoped that he was entering upon a career of useful- 
ness and influence. His untimely death has prevented the 
realization of these hopes and has brought sorrow to the 
people of Massachusetts, whom lie was so anxious to serve. 

O 



